composer/pianist
MIHOKO SUZUKI
Composer / Pianist
ABOUT
A composer and pianist, Mihoko explores a diverse range of multidisciplinary works for music-theater, dance, film, and performance installations. She is the mind behind Ciné Sonica, a film concert series that offers immersive cinematic experiences with the live music, and a co-founder of electro acoustic duo @61, which is a regular feature at the experimental music and art festival, Woodstockhausen.
Her projects have been awarded support from the NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Creative Engagement, and New Music USA. A classically trained pianist, Mihoko studied composition at Manhattan School of Music, where she received her Bachelor of Music degree.
Growing up in Japan, my musical life was revolved around daily rituals of piano practice and the thunderous stereo my older brother blasted. In the late ’70s and early ’80s, while I studied Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier and Beethoven piano sonatas, he filled the house with his obsession for British Progressive Rock and Fusion—ELP, King Crimson, Weather Report—all at full volume. Amazingly, no neighbor ever complained. That peculiar sonic tug-of-war left a lasting imprint on my adolescent ears.
Later, at music conservatoires, I explored the realm of Western music beyond German Classicism into Medieval, Renaissance, and 20th-century composers like Stravinsky, Bartók, Cage, and Reich. The echoes of childhood remained silent until my brother’s death in 1997. “Trust your ear,” my mentor Nils Vigeland once said. Only then did his words return—not as guidance, but as something I had always known.
PLAYLIST
DESERT WIDOW
Performance Art Film
written for cello and piano
And the Hummingbird Says...
Song Cycle for 4 voices ~excerpts
Liteny for the Animals
Opera/Oratorio ~excerpts
for 6 voices, clarnet, bassoon, and cello
PROJECTS
2018
"And the Hummingbird Says..."—a song cycle based on the ideas, words, and life of the late Kenyan environmentalist and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Wangari Maathai (1940-2011) with libretto by Martin Rowe. Written for 4 voices (SATB) sung a capella, the songs were premiered at Symphony Space in 2017, NYC, as a part of The Compassion Arts & Cultural and Animals Festival.
2016
"Desert Widow"—a performance Art film created by Jil Guyon with cinematography by Valerie Barnes and original score by Mihoko featuring cellist John Popham. The film has won an Accolade Film Award for Experimental Film and Best Experimental Film at the Women & Fashion FilmFest, NYC has also been featured at Cinedanse Quebec, Canada, Migrations Dance Film Festival, U.K. as well as San Francisco Dance Film Festival.
2014
"Ode to Number 14"—a piece for piano 4 hands, commissioned & performed by the piano duo
SaNaToMa in Alberta, Canada, was featured in The NYFA Collection CD last year, celebrating the
30th anniversary of its Artists' Fellowship Program.
2013
"Bhavacakra" (Cycle of Existence)—a chamber ensemble work, written for saxophone, electric
guitar, cello, bass, piano, an drums/marimba, was awarded a 2015 Artists' Fellowship by New York
Foundation for the Arts in the category of music/sound.
2011
"We Have a Beautiful Mother"—a cappella choral work, commissioned for the memorial ceremony
of Wangari Maathai—the Kenyan environmentalist / 2004 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. The SATB
setting of the same titled poem by Alice Walker was performed by Musica Sacra under the direction of Kent Tritle at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, NYC.
2005
"To the Dogs"—a visual-auditory ritual based on a 125-minute sound recording of 33 death row
dogs at New York City’s animal-control system. Featuring 4 performers (2 vocalists, a flutist and a dancer) and art installation by Sue Coe, presented at Galapagos Art Space in DUMBO and the 14th Street Y in the East Village, NYC.
2001-02 season
“Sideshows at the Seashore”—a ballet in collaboration with James Sutton, the winner of the
Columbia Artists-National Choreography Competition, commissioned & presented by New York
Theatre Ballet with Diana Byer, artistic director. Written for clarinet, saxophone, trombone & piano, the production premiered at the Sylvia & Danny Kaye Playhouse, NYC and has been showcased in annual national tours.
1997
"This World"—a song-cycle for 3 singers, a dancer, and amplified water sounds with live audio
manipulation, staged by the composer with text & sound design by Timothy Cramer; costumes by Yahya Tarzi, premiered at Washington Sq. Church, NYC.
1996
"Litany for the Animals"—a multimedia opera/oratorio for 6 female voices & chamber ensemble
(clarinet, bassoon & viola de gamba), conceived by the composer with visual direction & staging by Jil Guyon, costumes by Yahya Tarzi; video production by Imprints, premiered at Washington Sq. Church, NYC.